I say insolent familiarity, Sir," said Mr. Pickwick, turning upon Fogg with a fierceness of gesture which caused that person to retreat towards the door with great expedition by Phiz (Hablot K. Browne).
Household Edition (1874) of Dickens's Pickwick Papers, p. 384. Engraved by one of the Dalziels. [Click on image to enlarge it.]

In closing the original serial illustrations, Phiz and Dickens provided a
frontispiece that shows Sam Weller and Samuel Pickwick in the old gentleman's
library, retired from their adventures and seated at a round table on which
are books and an ink-stand, decanters and glasses, details suggesting that they
(like the purchaser of the final instalment and of the volume edition) are
enjoying the experience of reading about and reflecting on their adventures.
Effective as this frontispiece may be in emphasizing the mutually supportive
"Quixote/Panza" relationship of master and man, it does little to tie up the
loose ends of the novel's chief plot, the machinations of the lawyers Dodson
and Fogg in supporting Mrs. Bardell's breach of promise suit against the
protagonist. Indeed, as a volume "frontispiece," it could not give away specifics
about the outcome of the chief plot. The force of Nemesis or poetic
justice (which a modern reader might term "closure") requires that the
conclusion of the episodic novel involve the scurrilous lawyers' receiving some
sort of comeuppance, however. And so, without Dickens dictating to him what the
four plates for the final sequence of Household Edition chapters (originally,
the "double" number of November 1837, comprising chapters 53 through 57) would
be, Hablot Knight Browne was free at last to follow his inclination to see that
in his final woodcuts the devious legal partners would be recipients of divine
(if not human) justice in Perker's inner office at Gray's Inn, where shortly
before Jingle and Trotter have been recipients of divine forgiveness.

Thus, in winding up the "Bardell versus Pickwick" plot visually, Phiz
reintroduces the figures of Dodson and Fogg, last seen not in "The Trial" of
chapter 34 (for they are solicitors rather than barristers, and must
utilise the services of a barrister such as the oratorical Serjeant Buzfuz),
but in their interview with Pickwick and Sam at their chambers in "You just come avay," said Mr. Weller. "Battledore and
Shuttlecock's a wery good game, vhen you an't the shuttlecock and two lawyers
the battledores'". The sharp-nosed attorney with the white waistcoat in that
earlier illustration, standing behind the other, is probably Dodson, but neither
attorney in this later illustration much resembles his earlier counterpart.
Previously, in their own offices, operating in full view of their clerks, Dodson
(right) and Fogg (centre), are large, even expansive figures full of "cheek" and
self-confidence as they goad the inexperienced and naive Pickwick into
slandering and even assaulting them as an extension of their "sharp practice"
philosophy. As they observe of Pickwick when they meet him in Perker's office
after his release from the Fleet, the retired merchant is not so large as before
(they are referring to the effects of prison diet, but they might also be
commenting upon the effects of suffering on ego); however, now at a considerable
disadvantage, with no witnesses biased in their favour to support their
narrative of being vilified and even beaten, Dodson (right) and Fogg
(immediately in front of him, centre) are physically diminished as they shrink
from their indignant victim, his characteristic pose of having one hand under
coat tails as he gestures with the other recalling the opening scene of the
novel, when he addressed the Pickwickians.

The shading of their thin faces suggests not so much embarrassment as
shock and even fear, as Phiz has them retreating into the open doorway.
Phiz has chosen to give the umbrella to Dodson, mentioned in the text
as belonging to Fogg, and replace it (and Fogg's gloves as theatrical
properties) with a lawyer's blue bag, even though he has secured
Pickwick's payment in a pocketbook. In other words, no longer directed
by the author to remain scrupulously faithful to the details established
by the text, apparently Phiz felt free to invent and adjust, his most
significant change being the characterisation of the predatory
attorneys, whose slapping of the pocket, coyly disclosing the charges, mock
forgiveness and affability, and smirking certainly do not suggest that they are
abashed by Pickwick's accusations any more than they were in their own
office earlier. Perker's gesture implies that he desperately wants them
to leave rather than precipitate an altercation, even as Pickwick
sternly points them toward the door. Although Perker's clerk, Lowten, is
not in evidence, the reader presumes that he is just outside the right
margin of the illustration, on the other side of the open door. The
passage realised in this dramatic illustration is this:

Then both the partners laughed together — pleasantly
and cheerfully, as men who are going to receive money often do.

"We shall make Mr. Pickwick pay for peeping," said Fogg,
with considerable native humour, as he unfolded his papers. "The amount
of the taxed costs is one hundred and thirty-three, six, four, Mr.
Perker."

There was a great comparing of papers, and turning over
of leaves, by Fogg and Perker, after this statement of profit and loss.
Meanwhile, Dodson said, in an affable manner, to Mr. Pickwick —

"I don't think you are looking quite so stout as when I
had the pleasure of seeing you last, Mr. Pickwick."

"Possibly not, sir," replied Mr. Pickwick, who had been
flashing forth looks of fierce indignation, without producing the
smallest effect on either of the sharp practitioners; "I believe I am
not, sir. I have been persecuted and annoyed by scoundrels of late, sir."

Perker coughed violently, and asked Mr. Pickwick whether
he wouldn't like to look at the morning paper. To which inquiry Mr.
Pickwick returned a most decided negative.

"True," said Dodson, "I dare say you have been
annoyed in the Fleet; there are some odd gentry there. Whereabouts were
your apartments, Mr. Pickwick?"

"My one room," replied that much-injured gentleman, "was on the
Coffee-Room flight."

" Oh, indeed!" said Dodson. "I believe that is a very pleasant
part of the establishment."

" Very," replied Mr. Pickwick drily.

There was a coolness about all this, which, to a gentleman
of an excitable temperament, had, under the circumstances, rather an
exasperating tendency. Mr. Pickwick restrained his wrath by gigantic
efforts; but when Perker wrote a cheque for the whole amount, and Fogg
deposited it in a small pocket-book, with a triumphant smile playing
over his pimply features, which communicated itself likewise to the
stern countenance of Dodson, he felt the blood in his cheeks tingling
with indignation.

"Now, Mr. Dodson," said Fogg, putting up the pocket-book
and drawing on his gloves, "I am at your service."

"Very good," said Dodson, rising; "I am quite ready."

"I am very happy," said Fogg, softened by the cheque, "to
have had the pleasure of making Mr. Pickwick's acquaintance. I hope you
don't think quite so ill of us, Mr. Pickwick, as when we first had the
pleasure of seeing you."

"I hope not," said Dodson, with the high tone of
calumniated virtue. "Mr. Pickwick now knows us better, I trust; whatever
your opinion of gentlemen of our profession may be, I beg to assure you,
sir, that I bear no ill-will or vindictive feeling towards you for the
sentiments you thought proper to express in our office in Freeman's
Court, Cornhill, on the occasion to which my partner has referred."

"Oh, no, no; nor I," said Fogg, in a most forgiving manner.

"Our conduct, sir," said Dodson, "will speak for itself,
and justify itself, I hope, upon every occasion. We have been in the
profession some years, Mr. Pickwick, and have been honoured with the
confidence of many excellent clients. I wish you good-morning, sir."

"Good-morning, Mr. Pickwick," said Fogg. So saying, he put
his umbrella under his arm, drew off his right glove, and extended the
hand of reconciliation to that most indignant gentleman; who, thereupon,
thrust his hands beneath his coat tails, and eyed the attorney with
looks of scornful amazement.

"Lowten!" cried Perker, at this moment. "Open the door."

"Wait one instant," said Mr. Pickwick. "Perker, I will
speak."

"My dear sir, pray let the matter rest where it is," said
the little attorney, who had been in a state of nervous apprehension
during the whole interview; "Mr. Pickwick, I beg —"

"I will not be put down, sir," replied Mr. Pickwick
hastily. "Mr. Dodson, you have addressed some remarks to me."

Dodson turned round, bent his head meekly, and smiled.

"Some remarks to me," repeated Mr. Pickwick, almost
breathless; "and your partner has tendered me his hand, and you have
both assumed a tone of forgiveness and high-mindedness, which is an
extent of impudence that I was not prepared for, even in you."

"What, sir!" exclaimed Dodson.

"What, sir!" reiterated Fogg.

"Do you know that I have been the victim of your plots and
conspiracies?" continued Mr. Pickwick. "Do you know that I am the man
whom you have been imprisoning and robbing? Do you know that you were
the attorneys for the plaintiff, in Bardell and Pickwick?"

"I see that you recollect it with satisfaction," said Mr.
Pickwick, attempting to call up a sneer for the first time in his life,
and failing most signally in so doing. "Although I have long been
anxious to tell you, in plain terms, what my opinion of you is, I should
have let even this opportunity pass, in deference to my friend Perker's
wishes, but for the unwarrantable tone you have assumed, and your
insolent familiarity. I say insolent familiarity, sir," said Mr.
Pickwick, turning upon Fogg with a fierceness of gesture which caused
that person to retreat towards the door with great expedition.

"Take care, sir," said Dodson, who, though he was the
biggest man of the party, had prudently entrenched himself behind Fogg,
and was speaking over his head with a very pale face. "Let him assault
you, Mr. Fogg; don't return it on any account."

"No, no, I won't return it," said Fogg, falling back a
little more as he spoke; to the evident relief of his partner, who by
these means was gradually getting into the outer office.

"You are," continued Mr. Pickwick, resuming the thread of
his discourse — "you are a well-matched pair of mean, rascally,
pettifogging robbers."

"Well," interposed Perker, "is that all?"

"It is all summed up in that," rejoined Mr. Pickwick;
"they are mean, rascally, pettifogging robbers."

"There!" said Perker, in a most conciliatory tone. "My
dear sirs, he has said all he has to say. Now pray go. Lowten, is that
door open?"

Unfortunately, Phiz could not capture the delightful comedy of Pickwick's
denunciation of the black-suited rogues or communicate the irony of Pickwick's
condemnatory interrogation of the lawyers or their shift in attitude
from bantering superiority to fear for their safety. In the imaginative
or "anti-reality" world of the nine interpolated tales of the novel,
genuine Nemesis is possible, even logical, since these are oral
tales with the traditional moral compass of cautionary and instructive short
fiction. However, in the novel, the contemporary world of Charles
Dickens (although the action is set back some half-a-dozen years from
the time of part-publication and initial reading), a denunciation of
meanness, baseness, and duplicity rather than a more severe punishment
is the best that the middle-class reader, pondering the moral state of
contemporary society, can expect — especially when looking for
poetic justice that corrects the professional misconduct of lawyers.

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